ИСТИНА

The existing gap between the university performance in training the intellectual elite of the society and university engagement in the development of the socially responsible community in the region hinders the practical implementation of the third university mission (Loredo, 2007; Trencher et al., 2013). In this regard, the initiation of the university function as of a partner in regional development requires to identify its place in the development of the social sector of the university home cities and territories. Here, our approach to examine closely the university transformation is consistent with the agenda for the development of higher education in the OECD countries (European Union, 2011). In the implementation of the third mission, the university needs to become a driver of civic initiatives and development of communities that provide conditions for coordinating the actions of the main participants in innovation and technological development in the region (Gulbrandsen & Slipersaeter, 2007). Here, a university in order to become an entrepreneurial entity, or entrepreneurial university, (Etzkowitz, 2004) needs those prerequisites as maturity of communities which are prone to the regional social development. The university third mission anticipates the embeddedness of economic relations in the practices of social networks within the regions and territories (Granovetter, 1985).